Louisa Ruth Herbert | |
|---|---|
 Ruth Herbert, portrait by Dante Gabriel Rossetti | |
| Born | 1831 |
| Died | 1921 (aged 89–90) |
| Occupation(s) | London stage actress, theatre manager, artists' model |
| Spouse(s) | Edward Crabb, Mr. Rochfort |
Louisa Ruth Herbert (1831 – 1921) was a well-knownVictorian-eraEnglish stage actress and model for the artistDante Gabriel Rossetti.
She was the daughter of aWest Countrybrassfounder. She was also known as Mrs. Crabbe, having married Edward Crabb, a share and stock dealer, which gave her a certain measure of respectability generally lacking in actresses in the Victorian era. By the mid-1850s, she was no longer living with her husband. She embellished the surname Crabb with a final "e" but used her maiden name as a stage name.
She had performed at theTheatre Royal, Glasgow in 1855[1] before she made her London stage debut on 15 October 1855 at the lower-classRoyal Strand Theatre.[2] She also acted at theOlympic Theatre before moving on toSt. James's Theatre, London.
Her early roles were incomedy andburlesque productions and she drew eyes with her beauty. She drew favorable reviews with her performance as the lead inTom Taylor'sRetribution at the Olympic. One of her well-known roles was the lead in an 1863 stage production of the sensation novelLady Audley's Secret at St. James's Theatre. AuthorMary Elizabeth Braddon said Herbert gave her favorite performance as Lady Audley.[3]
She later managed the St. James's Theatre, London from 1864 to 1868. She hired the then little-knownHenry Irving as her leading man and assistant stage manager at the theatre.[4][5] One of the plays that she commissioned there wasW. S. Gilbert's first successful solo play,Dulcamara, or the Little Duck and the Great Quack (1866).[6]
She first posed for Rossetti's painting 1858 paintingMary Magdalen at the Door of Simon the Pharisee. Rossetti called her a "stunner," one of the beautiful women he sought out as models for his art. As he was waiting for her to arrive, he wrote his friendWilliam Bell Scott of his enthusiasm for her:
"I am in the stunning position this morning of expecting the actual visit at 1/2 past 11 of a model whom I have been longing to paint for years – Miss Herbert of the Olympic Theatre – who has the most varied and highest expression I ever saw in a woman's face, besides abundant beauty, golden hair, etc. Did you ever see her? O my eye! she has sat to me now and will sit to me forMary Magdalene in the picture I am beginning. Such luck![7]
Herbert went on to sit often for Rossetti in 1858 and 1859. Rossetti and Herbert did not stay in regular contact past 1860, though he based a future work on the drawing and painting he had done of her previously.[8]
Herbert bequeathed several of the drawings made of her by Rossetti to her son, Major A.B. Crabbe, and they were sold at auction atChristie's in 1922.[9]
Herbert later married again, to John DownesRochfort (son of Col.John Staunton Rochfort and younger half-brother ofHorace William Noel Rochfort), and published a cookbook calledThe St. James's Cookery Book in 1894 under her married name, Louisa Rochfort.[10][11]
